Kinetic and competitive study of uranium (VI) adsorption by chitosan/baker’s yeast nanofiber

In this study, the ability of the chitosan/baker’s yeast nanofiber was prepared by the electerospinning technique for adsorption of uranium (VI) from aqueous solution was investigated. The adsorption experiments were carried out to investigate the effect of different adsorption parameters, such as contact time in a batch system. More than 77.86% of uranium (VI) adsorbed on the nanofiber adsorbent of the initial contact times of 90 min and then the adsorption capacity values of metal ions slowly approach to in equilibrium values. The kinetic data was fitted with Pseudo-first-order model, Pseudo-second-order model and Double-exponential model. Based on results, the Double-exponential model describes the experimental data well. So, adsorption onto chitosan/baker’s yeast nanofiber adsorbent consists of two steps, the first step includes external diffusion (rapid step) and second step includes the pore diffusion (slow phase). Also, the overall adsorption tendency of chitosan/baker’s yeast nanofiber toward uranium (VI) in the presence of Cu(II), Fe(II), Ni(II), Co(II) and Cd(II) under competitive conditions, followed the order: U(VI) gt; Co(II) gt; Cd(II) gt; Cu(II) gt; Fe(II) gt; Ni(II).